


A New Beginning

by Dormammu



Category: Avengers Assemble (Cartoon), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Dorks in Love, Fluff, M/M, Oblivious Steve Rogers, Oblivious Tony, Pre-Slash, Season/Series 01, Steve Drawing Tony, Steve is a Puppy, Steve watching Tony work, but Tony is obliviouser
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-17
Updated: 2018-02-17
Packaged: 2019-03-20 08:10:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13713549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dormammu/pseuds/Dormammu
Summary: Avengers are back on, Tony is their new leader, that in itself is awesome. What's more awesome is that Steve still likes to listen to Tony talk about his tech, and watch Tony work, and draw him like he's the prettiest person in the world.Pre-slash set somewhere around 1x03.





	A New Beginning

Tony was sitting in the kitchen, finishing his late night cup of coffee.

Sam had been there just a moment ago, they'd discussed his new quarters, Tony offering to set him up with an entertainment system to shame all the award winning mancaves of the world. Sam politely declined, quoting his inability to do anything productive once he got going on a Playstation as the reason. Sam did ask him for a corner in his lab, Tony said he'd think about it, knowing he wouldn't, instead he'd give Sam his own lab, equipped with cutting edge tech. Tony was just not the kind of scientist who liked sharing labs. He liked his peace.

Now he was alone, and he thought about all the stuff he was going to do that night. His new armor definitely needed some tweaking, and the team always needed more tech.

He couldn't believe it still, Avengers were a team again, and he was their leader.

He took another sip of coffee. He'd never noticed how awkward it was to drink from a cup when smiling goofily. Maybe he'd think about a new cup invention and maybe he'd call it a smup, like a smug cup. He thought about various designs he could put on the smups, maybe he could flog a new Avengers line of inventive beverage containers. He got caught up in the marketing strategies (Cap would have to be in a commercial, possibly topless) and didn't hear the sound of footsteps softly approaching.

"What is it this time?" Captain America said in an amused voice. "A new armor or something even better?"

Tony swallowed a glob of coffee. Coughed a little.

"You know there's nothing better than a new armor," he said in a hoarse voice, feeling just a tiny bit embarrassed.

Cap sat down opposite of him, poured some milk into a cup with an Iron Man helmet. That one seemed to be his favorite, to Tony's unspoken pride.

"I'm sure if there is something better, you'll be the one to invent it."

Tony tried not to smile at that, but it was difficult with Cap looking at him over a cup with his helmet on it, his blue eyes smiling.

"Gonna work on my armor," Tony said, sliding his finger over the saucer under his cup, "and then I might, if I feel like it, try working on some new stuff..."

Steve's ears perked up at that. He put down his cup of milk, pushed it away and put his hands on the table. His attention was all Tony's now.

"I've recently discovered a new use for the Symplectic Field Theory, patent still pending... But if I start talking about it, I'm gonna bore you silly," Tony lifted an eyebrow in question, hoping he wouldn't. He used to love talking shop with Steve and explaining all the uses of his new inventions, it had produced some new insights more than once back when they used to live in the Mansion. For some reason Steve was really good at inspiring new ideas without even doing much and Tony hoped he still liked his little TED-talks for a rapt audience of one.

"Oh yeah, I read about it in Futura. Pretty advanced stuff, if you can make it work."

Tony gasped theatrically in mock offense. "Do you even know me, Rogers?"

"What was I thinking?" Steve said, smiling. "No, I'd love to hear about it, you make it all sound so easy and so promising."

Why was Tony's heart beating quicker, and why was he suddenly feeling like he was going to melt in his chair? He decided not to go there thoughts-wise.

"So, as you know, I've been working on this for years," Tony started.

  
Several hours - and several new insights that came to Tony during his little lecture to Steve - later, Tony realized it was deep in the night and he'd still done nothing.

"Crap," he said looking at his watch, "I really have to go work now."

Steve looked slightly disappointed. He'd been listening to Tony talk about fields and manifolds for hours, it seemed he couldn't get enough. "Oh," he said.

"I'll send you some of my papers if you want to read about all this some more," Tony said, looking at Steve apologetically.

"That'd be nice," Steve said, not quite looking at him.

Tony had a brilliant idea.

"Or," he said slowly, "if you want to hang some more, you can come with me to the lab. I have chairs. And I'd love your input on some... stuff."

He'd done it now, he regretted asking Steve as soon as the offer came out of his mouth. Who in their right mind wanted to spend time in an uncomfortable lab chair, watching Tony work? Dum-e? He didn't count though.

But Steve got up as if something had bit him, said, "Really? I can watch you work? You won't mind?"

Sometimes Tony worried about the guy, luckily the worry was overwritten by a feeling of "Holy crap, he wants to watch me work!" this time.

"No. But I can only offer you a chair, and not a great one."

Steve waved his hand dismissively. Then his eyes got all wide and puppy-cute, "Can I just go get my sketchpad?"

This was not a new thing, Steve loved to draw the Avengers, but it always felt somewhat embarrassing to Tony, that Steve watched him and put him to paper, somehow intimate. On the other hand, his vanity always liked the results, because Steve had a knack for getting his good sides.

"I... sure." Tony smiled.

  
In the lab, Tony set to work, and Steve set to watching, and sketching. Sometimes they'd exchange a word or two, but mostly they just existed together in the small universe of Tony's lab. Later, Tony thought about it, and couldn't quite place his finger on the reason he felt so comfortable with Steve in his personal space. So comfortable he'd feel weirdly alone there for a few days after each Steve's visit.

  
In the early morning, Tony was still working when he heard a soft sound of snoring coming from Steve's chair. He wanted to put a blanket over him but he had none in his lab. He'd have to wake him up, because that chair was really uncomfortable aynway and even a supersoldier would feel it after spending a night in the damned thing.

He walked up to Steve and saw a drawing of himself under Steve's hand. Slowly he pulled it out. The drawing had Tony working on a circuit, his head bowed, his tongue peeking between his lips, his hair a mess. It was so detailed. So... arty. A nerd working on his circuits shouldn't have looked so... so... Tony struggled with finding a word to describe the drawing of himself. None was quite adequate. He'd ask Steve to give him the drawing as a present.

"Cap," he said softly. "Cap."

Steve opened his eyes slowly, groaned softly. "Tony?" He glanced around. "Oh, must've fallen asleep."

"Yeah," Tony said in a soft voice and shrugged. "I guess I wasn't that interesting."

Steve opened his mouth to say something. Then decided not to. He smiled instead, and it looked much cuter than it should have with that sleepy look on his face. "I guess," he said finally, "you'll have to be more interesting next time, Iron Man."

There would be a next time?

"But I gotta say," Steve continued sleepily, "you need to get me a better chair, this one is a torture device."

"As you wish, Cap," Tony said, not even thinking. He'd bring him a bed if he wanted.

Steve chuckled. "You're cute," he said. Then, seemingly realizing what he'd said, he amended to "I mean... funny cute. And sweet." He yawned loudly. "I need some sleep."

"I'll escort you to your room," Tony offered.

"No," Steve said, sighing sleepily, "I'll escort _you_ to your room."

  
They escorted each other, their rooms being neighbours across the hallway.

"We should do this again," Steve said, entering his room. "Soon."

Tony smiled and nodded in answer.

Steve's door closed. Tony got into his own room. He felt both sleepy and giddy, too tired to do any more work. From under his T-shirt he pulled out a drawing of himself, the one he saw first and liked. If this was the last time Steve spent the night in his lab watching him work and drawing him, Tony'd have a keepsake. Steve wouldn't miss it, he was sure, he made at least a dozen of drawings over the night.

  
As his head sank into his pillow, Tony thought about Steve, how willing he was to spend hours in that chair. He felt like something was blossoming in his chest. Something warm, reminding him of smiling blue eyes behind an Iron Man cup, the most gorgeous drawing of him in the world, and the sound of Steve's sleepy voice saying "You're cute."

  
It was great to be the new leader of the Avengers, he thought as he fell asleep.

 

-The End- 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be a tiny small drabble, but I guess AA is just too damn inspiring!:)


End file.
